A Scot in the Dark

Chapter 14

A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WARDS

As a man with a powerful sense of self-worth and a minuscule amount of actual worth, Derek Hawkins spent the majority of his time in full view of Society, trying to convince the aristocracy that the former was as well-founded as the latter was a travesty.

Consequently, he was never at home in the evenings.

No doubt, on that particular evening, he was at a club, or a dinner, or revealing his outrageous pomposity to a group of simpering women, each more desperate than the last to win the attention of the great Derek Hawkins, if for only a moment.

Not that Lily did not understand that desperation.

She had, after all, basked in its glow for long enough to be summarily ruined.

Lily had no doubt that if he weren’t so obsessed with the world’s perception of him and his genius, he wouldn’t have so summarily ruined her. Certainly, he wouldn’t have paraded the woman in his already famed painting in front of all the world, without hesitation.

Without consent.

But no one had ever been important enough to Derek Hawkins to inspire him to act with honor. She knew that now. Was grateful for it, even, as she found she had no qualms entering his home, uninvited, when she knew he was not home.

If he did not want her there, he should have asked her to return her key, no?

Locking the door carefully behind her, she turned, ready to climb the stairs to her destination quickly, eager to avoid the housekeeper, who doubled as cook, and the butler, who doubled as valet.

She had not expected to find the house so dark, however, and eerily quiet. She’d hoped for fires in the hearths along the way, some dim light to reveal her path, but there was nothing. She found a candle on the table near the door, and scrambled to light it.

When that was done, she should have immediately headed for her destination—but something about the emptiness of light and sound made her curious. She ducked into the front room, which had, when she had played the role of Derek’s muse, been filled with elaborate gilded furniture.

It stood empty now.

The discovery sent her further into the bowels of the house, toward the kitchens, where a fire was always lit. The two aging servants were rarely far from the warmth of the room. Tonight, however, they were nowhere to be found. The hearth was dark. And there was a pile of dishware next to the large sink that was unexpected.

Someone was living here. Alone.

Returning to the front of the house, she peeked into other rooms, finding each one empty of its contents. A stray chair here and there, but no room ready to receive. Her heart in her throat, she crept up the stairs. Was it possible he no longer lived here? The thought spurred her forward, fast and full of nerves.

What if it wasn’t here?

She opened the door to his bedchamber, immediately grateful for the sweet scent of his preferred perfume assaulting her. He lived here. Which meant the painting was here. She crossed the room, putting her hand to the door that adjoined his most precious space, the room he called his Room of Genius. She tried the handle, only to find it locked.

Of course.

Setting the candle on the low table between the bed and the door to his studio, Lily opened a drawer to search for the key. It had to be there. She’d come too far for it not to be there.

And that’s when she heard the sound, soft and nearly silent from beyond the room itself. There was someone there.

Heart threatening to beat from her chest, Lily turned left and right, desperately seeking an exit. She was on the third floor of the house, so escaping via the window was not an option. There was a massive cupboard on the other side of the room, large enough for two people, if she had to guess, but far too close to the door to the hallways beyond to consider it as a hiding place.

The noise came again, and her gaze flew to the door, convinced that she could hear the handle turning.

Derek was here.

She was under the bed in seconds, with a little prayer of thanks to her maker for men’s clothing. She’d never have fit with skirts and crinoline.

She held her breath as the door opened, and she squeezed her eyes shut, holding her breath and trying with every ounce of her energy to resist the urge to move. To turn her head. To flee.

The door closed, and he was in the room with her.

It was only then that she realized she’d left the candle burning. He would know instantly that someone had been there. That someone was there.

This had been a terrible mistake.

Footsteps sounded, quiet and firm as he moved through the room.

The door to the armoire opened quickly. Closed.

She willed her breath to come easily, desperate to keep quiet.

He made his way slowly around the foot of the bed, black boots coming into view as he crossed to the table where the candle burned. The light shifted, and though she could not see, she assumed he had lifted the candle.

And then the bed shifted above her. Just barely, and her eyes widened as the boots moved. And a bare leg came into view.

Followed by a knee, and a fall of tartan.

And the candle, held by a massive bronzed hand.

And, finally, Alec’s face.

She squeaked her surprise, her heart seeming to pound worse with the reveal of his identity than it had done when she thought he was Derek. “What are you doing here?”

“You have two options,” he said, the words low and rumbling with brogue. “You may come out from under there, or I will come in and fetch you.”

She narrowed her gaze. “Now you wish to keep my company?”

His features matched her own. “What does that mean?”

You left me, she wanted to say. Alone. Wishing for you. Instead, she settled on, “I cannot come out until you move, Duke.” He raised a brow, but moved, and she followed him out, coming to her feet, already fighting. “What are you doing here?”

“Making sure you don’t get yourself caught or killed.”

“Killed,” she scoffed. “No one is going to kill me.”

“You could have fallen from the window—how were you even able to make a bedsheet rope?”

“Sesily taught me.”

He looked to the ceiling. “Of course she did. The scandalous leading the scandalous.”

“She is my friend,” she said, “And I did not fall. As you see, I am quite alive.”

“Remarkably,” he replied. “You took a hack here, dressed in . . .” He paused, and fury flashed in his eyes, “Whatever this is.”

She looked down at the ill-fitting trousers and the too-large shirt and coat. “It’s men’s clothing!”

“You look ridiculous! No one in his right mind would think you male. At best he’d think you an urchin playing fancy dress.”

“The driver didn’t seem to notice.”

“The driver also didn’t notice you were being followed, so I would not laud his powers of observation.”

Her brow furrowed. “You cannot simply follow a woman wherever she goes, you know. You nearly scared me half to death.”

“You broke into a man’s house and hid beneath his bed!” he said. “What if it had been him and not me?”

“It was not him!” she whispered, irritated. “It was you! And you shouldn’t be here!”

“Oh, but you belong here?”

“More than you!”

“I forgot,” he said, “you have a damn key! I assume this is Hawkins’s bedchamber?”

“Not that it is any of your business,” she replied, “but he never reclaimed the key.”

“That is absolutely no reason to use it,” he snapped. “Are you lying in wait for him? Planning to tempt him back to you?”

He was horrible.

Lily narrowed her gaze. “How did you guess,” she responded, unable to keep the sarcasm from her voice. “This is my special brand of seduction: ill-fitting men’s clothing and hiding beneath beds for men who have no qualms ruining me.”

His brows rose. “I do not pretend to understand the female mind.”

She snatched the candle from his hand. “Go away. You’re not welcome here.”

“And you are?”

“I’ve business to attend to. I shan’t take long.”

He paused, watching her for a long moment before he narrowed his gaze on her and said, “Why are you here?”

“Does it matter?”

“It does if you still love him.”

The words rendered her speechless. “Love him?”

It seemed impossible to imagine now, two months later, with all that had happened. The painting. The exhibition.

Alec.

Not that Alec impacted her heart. At all.

Liar.

She cleared her throat at the thought. “Why not speak your mind, Your Grace?”

He scowled at the honorific. “Do you love him? Still?”

“No,” she said, unable to keep the shock from her voice. “Of course not. He is nothing of what I thought he was. Especially not now. Especially now that I—” Especially now that I am able to compare him to you.

Alec remained scowling. “Then why are you here?”

She sighed, looking past him to the door to Derek’s studio. “If you must know, I’m here to take matters into my own hands.”

“What does that mean?”

“Only that I am tired of waiting for salvation to find me. I’ve had guardians and suitors and men who made more pretty promises than I can count. And I am tired of believing those promises. It’s time for me to make my own promise. To myself.”

He did not move. “And what promise is that?”

“The promise to save myself.” She pointed to the door. “That’s his studio. Two months ago, that’s where he painted the portrait.”

He inhaled sharply. “And?”

“And, as the subject of the painting in question, I intend to take what’s mine.”

There was a long silence as the words settled between them, before he nodded once. “Let’s do it, then.”

She shook her head. “I just told you that I don’t require a savior. I shall save myself this time.”

He turned toward the door to the studio. “I heard you. But I am here and this door is locked.”

“I was about to look for a key when you terrified me into hiding,” she snapped.

He looked back at her. “Under the bed, by the way, is a terrible place to hide. What if he’d been heading for sleep? You’d have been stuck under there all night.”

She raised a brow. “You’re simply jealous that you wouldn’t have fit under the bed.”

A smile flashed at the irritated insult, and Lily loathed the warmth that coursed through her at the knowledge that she’d made him laugh.

She didn’t care about making him laugh.

He’d turned away, at any rate. With a firm tug, he tore the door from the jamb, as though the lock were made of paper and glue, and the warmth was replaced with shock as she stared at the demolished doorway. “Tell me, Your Grace, do houses in Scotland have doors?”

He did not hesitate. “Rarely.”

She should not find him amusing. “Now Derek will realize we were here.”

“You do not think he will notice when the painting is gone?” Alec said, as though it were that simple.

It occurred to Lily that it probably should be that simple. That she’d been willing to enter the room and take the painting, and Derek would have known when he returned that someone had done it. But for some reason, the splintered wood, the proof that it had been Alec who was here—it struck her. He’d followed her from the house, all the way here, and inside to ensure her safety, and once he’d heard her plans for the evening, he hadn’t forced her to leave them. Instead, he’d offered to help. In his own way.

By removing the door that had been her final barrier to success.

Somehow, despite being an enormous, overbearing, entirely difficult man, he’d also been tremendously kind.

He set the door to the side and retrieved the candle from the bedside table, lifting it into the darkness of the studio beyond.

Which was when the candle became a glowing reminder of what he would find within.

“Wait!” Lily cried as she tore past him into the darkness, putting her back to the room, placing herself squarely between his light and the paintings beyond. “No.” She extended her hand. “Give it to me.”

He clearly thought she was mad. “We don’t have time for this, Lillian.”

She shook her head. “You’re not coming in.”

“Why the hell not?”

“Because I won’t have you seeing it.”

“Seeing what?” She cut him a look. “Oh.”

“Precisely,” she said. “Oh.”

“I won’t look,” he said, advancing, pressing her back into the room.

“You’re correct,” she replied, forcing herself to stop moving. To stand her ground. “You won’t look. Because you won’t see it.”

He looked to the ceiling. “Lillian. We haven’t any time for this.”

She beckoned to the candle. “Then give me the candle.”

He relinquished the light. “There. Can you find the damn thing and let’s go?”

“First, promise you won’t look.”

“You’re being ridiculous.”

“That may well be the case. But it’s my reputation that requires protecting.”

“I’ve been trying to protect you! From the start!” he argued.

“And you may finish by promising to avert your eyes from anything you see that might be scandalous.”

“It’s a painting, Lillian. It was made to be seen.”

Sadness flared, along with frustration and the shame that she loathed so much. He was not wrong. How could she not have expected it to be seen? But somehow, the idea that he might see it . . . it changed everything. “I didn’t intend it to be seen.”

He was silent for a long time, and she wished for more light, so she could see his eyes when he said, finally, “Fine.”

“Promise.”

“I promise.”

“The rest.”

He sighed. “I promise I won’t look.”

“Turn your back.”

“Lillian.”

She held her ground. “You wish to be my guardian? Guard. Watch the door.”

He hesitated for the barest of moments before releasing a long breath of exasperated air and turning from her. “Just get the damn thing.”

She nodded. “Excellent,” she said, turning to begin her search.

There was only one problem, she realized as she lifted the candle and redirected her attention to the room she’d known so well.

It, too, was empty.

Everything was gone. The paintings that had lined the walls, the low settee where she’d posed for days, the easel Derek had furiously, painstakingly worked over as the sun flooded the room, making dust dance in the air between them. It was all gone.

She supposed she shouldn’t be surprised. After all, everything that had to do with Derek Hawkins was fleeting, as though he only existed when in the presence of others.

Perhaps that was true of the painting, as well.

Perhaps it only existed when viewed by all London.

She laughed, high-pitched and panicked, and Alec turned. “What?” That’s when he noticed the room. “Where is everything?”

She shook her head. “Gone.”

“Gone where?”

She turned to him. “I don’t know. It was here.” She pointed to the wall where windows received brilliant southern light throughout the day. “The painting was right there.”

He scowled. “You posed here?”

She ignored the question, instead repeating one of his earlier ones. “Where is everything?” She giggled, the sound high and unsettling and panicked. “Where did it go?”

Alec crossed to her. “Lily,” he said quietly, “we’ll find it. There are a finite amount of places where he could have hidden it.”

“There are a hundred places,” she said. “A thousand.” Frustration grew, tightening in her chest. “This is not a Scottish keep, Alec. It is London.” She paused. Looked at him. “Do you believe in fate?”

“No.”

She smiled, small and sad. “I do. This was my only chance. My opportunity to save myself. Perhaps, though . . . perhaps my disgrace is fated.”

“It’s not.”

She didn’t reply, turning back to the room to whisper to the empty walls, “I wanted to find it.”

For the first time in three weeks, one day, she’d had hope that her life might be hers once more. That she might survive.

She looked to him. “I begged you to let me run. To let me end it my way. And then you gave me hope and I thought this was the answer.”

“It is,” he said, his gaze firm and full of something akin to pride. “Clever girl. It is. We will find it. Anywhere in London. Running is not the answer. This is.”

And, God save her, she almost believed him. His sure certainty, as though all he had to do was will it so and it was done.

She almost believed him. “I thought it would be here.”

“And if it were mine, I would keep it here.” The reply came without hesitation.

She looked up, meeting his eyes, whisky in the golden candlelight. “What does that mean?”

He looked away, as though he’d been caught confessing something he should not have. “Only that I would keep it close.”

“If it were your best hope of a legacy, you mean.”

“No,” he said softly. “That’s not what I mean.”

She caught her breath at the words, at the way they thickened the air around them. “What then?”

He was so close, now, close enough to touch, and Lily was consumed with the keen memory of two nights prior, in the carriage. Of touching him. Of him touching her.

She shouldn’t do it.

Not here. Not ever.

And still, she lifted a hand, feeling the tremors in it as she set it to his chest, feeling his heart beating strong and fast beneath the swath of tartan that crossed his shoulder. Time stopped. They both stared at that place, where her pale hand rested against the red of his plaid.

He was so strong.

So warm.

Her gaze lifted to find his gaze on hers, waiting for her. Quiet and strong and patient, as though it were his whole purpose. To wait for her. To be with her.

To be hers.

Her lips parted at the thought, and his attention flickered to the movement, the dark and silence cloaking them in each other.

She lifted her chin, offering herself to him. He dipped his head, closing the distance between them. Yes. Please.

She would give anything for him.

Her eyes slid shut.

“Lily,” he whispered, the word a kiss of breath against her lips, filled with devastation and desire.

Yes.

And then he released her. Cleared his throat. “We should leave before he returns.”

Like that, it was over, and the room spun with the speed of his departure.

She pressed her fingers to her lips, wishing she could will away the ache there—the wanting. He wanted to kiss her. She’d seen it.

Why hadn’t he done it?

Was it Derek? Was it her past? Was he too reminded of what she had done here?

Of who she had become here?

Regret came, harsh and painful, and Lily stiffened, hating it. Hating all of it. Every minute that had led her to this moment, in the room where she’d laid herself bare for one man, and ached for another.

With no choice, she followed Alec back into the bedchamber, attempting to appear as unmoved by the moment as he was. “What if he’s left? Absconded with it?”

Alec ripped open the doors to the massive wardrobe in the corner, revealing a sea of clothing in silks and satins and wools and linens—every color imaginable. “I assume he is not gone.”

She shook her head, drawing nearer. “Derek would never leave his clothes behind.”

He looked to her. “He’s a peacock, you know.”

“I know,” she said, reaching for a turquoise vest, brocaded in gold thread. “But peacocks can be very compelling.”

A low rumble sounded from his chest, followed by a distinctly grumpy, “Compelling is not the same as worthwhile.”

Her fingers stilled on the shimmering blue fabric. “Scotsmen are the latter, I suppose?” Later, she would wonder why on earth she thought the words appropriate. Where on earth the words had come from.

But in the moment, as they stood in the dark, her past and future colliding in disappointment and frustration and doom, she didn’t care.

He looked at her, the silence of the house cacophonous between them. He cleared his throat, and Lily heard the nervous catch there. “More worthwhile than he is.”

More compelling, as well.

She closed the wardrobe doors and turned, pressing her back to them, staring up at Alec towering above her. “Why did you leave me?”

His brow furrowed. “I’m here.”

You left me here, as well.

She shook her head. “This afternoon. With Stanhope.”

“You told me to leave you.”

Had she? She supposed she had. But then—she shook her head. “But you didn’t leave me. You saved me. And then you left me.”

He was silent for a long moment, and she would have given anything to know what he was thinking. Finally, he said, “You were well. And Stanhope was there.”

It was what she had expected—a quick, perfunctory answer. But it wasn’t true. And she knew it. She shook her head. “But why did you leave me?”

“Because . . .” He trailed off, and silence stretched between them for an eternity before he added, “Because you deserve someone like him.”

“I don’t want someone like him,” she said.

“Why the hell not? Stanhope is a damn prince among men.”

“He’s very kind,” she said.

“Is that a problem?” he sputtered. “Kind, handsome, titled, and charming. The holy trinity of qualities.”

She smiled. “That’s four qualities.”

He narrowed his gaze on her. “What is wrong with you, Lily? You could have him. He knows about the painting and doesn’t mind. Indeed, he seemed only to enjoy your company.”

She should want Frederick, Lord Stanhope. She should sink to her knees and thank the stars that he was willing to have her. And yet . . . she didn’t.

She was too busy wanting another. Impossibly so.

Not that she could tell him that. “We’ve known each other for two hours. He couldn’t possibly desire me.”

“Any man in his right mind would desire you after two minutes.”

She blinked.

He shut his mouth.

“What did you say?”

“Nothing. We must go.”

“I’m a scandal.”

“You’re the very best kind of scandal,” he grumbled as he headed for the door to the room.

At least, that’s what she thought he said. “I didn’t hear you.”

“You’re the very worst kind of scandal,” he said, louder.

That wasn’t what he had said. She couldn’t keep her smile from her face. “What does that mean?”

“You’re the kind of scandal a man wants to claim for his own.”

She gaped at him. She’d never in her life heard something so romantic. And she certainly hadn’t expected it to come from the mouth of this massive, moody Scot.

“That’s very kind,” she said.

“There’s nothing kind about it,” he said.

“There is, though,” she said. “Derek didn’t want me at all. And that was before I was a scandal.”

“Hawkins was an idiot,” he said, more sound than words. He was stopped now, at the closed door to the room, one hand splayed wide against the mahogany.

She was transfixed by that hand. By its ridges and valleys. By the scar that ran an inch below his first knuckle, stark white against the brown of his skin. “What happened to your hand?”

He did not move. “I met with the jagged end of a broken bottle.”

“How?”

“My father was an angry drunk.”

Lily winced, wanting to go to him. Instead she said, “I’m sorry.”

Still he did not look at her. “Don’t be. I left the day after he did this.”

“I’m sorry no one was there to care for you.”

The fingers flexed against the wood—the only indication that he heard her. “We should leave.”

“Do you think someone will want me?” she asked that hand, knowing she shouldn’t. Knowing that the question revealed far too much of what she wanted.

He pressed his forehead to the door and spoke in low, growling Gaelic before switching to English. “Yes, Lillian. I think someone will want you.”

“Do—” She stopped herself.

She couldn’t ask him.

No matter how much she liked the idea.

“Don’t ask me,” he whispered, and the sound made her ache.

He couldn’t. He didn’t like her. He never seemed to like her, that was. He seemed to view her as nothing but trouble.

Didn’t he?

She could not bear it. “Do you? Want me?”

He did not swear in Gaelic that time. He swore in fast, wicked English.

“Don’t answer,” she said, immediately, at once terrified he might and desperate for him to.

He did not lift his head from its place against the door. “I’m to protect you. I’m to protect you.” He said it like a litany, for himself. For God. Not for her. “I’m to protect you.”

“Don’t answer,” she repeated, ignoring the pang of rich desire coursing through her. It was simply that in the moment, she’d wished him to. Quite desperately.

Because, if Alec wanted her, she might have a chance at the life of which she’d once dreamed. With a man far more noble than she’d ever imagined.

I’m to protect you.

And perhaps it was that she had spent so much of her life alone, but the idea of being protected, of being partnered with someone who wished for her safety as she wished for his, was the most tempting thing she’d ever experienced.

But he’d left her, after all. Ridden away, as though they were nothing to each other.

And perhaps they weren’t.

She’d never been very good at understanding what she was to others. Or what they were to her, for that matter.

She nodded once, desperate to put the whole conversation behind her. “I understand. The answer is no. I should never have asked.”

There was a long moment, when she thought he might reply. Thought he might turn his head, look at her.

Tell me you want me, she willed him. Tell me this . . . us . . . it could be.

He didn’t. Instead, he let out a long, ragged breath and that hand that transfixed her balled into a fist. He pressed it against the door, his knuckles going stark white, the tendons in his arms straining. And then he spoke.

“No,” he said. “You shouldn’t have.”

He opened the door with a force that would have ripped it from the hinge if it were locked, as the studio door had been.

And he disappeared into the darkness.